History professor Bianca Murillo is the latest recipient of the Graves Award in the Humanities.
Bestowed every other year, the award will enable Murillo to travel to Morocco, Algeria and Egypt to pursue her project, “Trans-Saharan History: Centering Connectivity in African Studies.”
By visiting these destinations — all important transfer points in North Africa for trans-Saharan goods — she hopes to explore historical and popular representations of the Sahara and desert crossings.
“The Graves Award will not only enhance my ability to mentor, advise and teach students in African Studies, it will also provide the experience to develop a sub-specialty in trans-Saharan history for another book project,” Murillo says.
This is the fifteenth time a Willamette faculty member has received the award since Professor Emeritus Roger Hull secured a Graves in 1971 to visit Europe for the first time.
The Graves Award is sponsored by Pomona College, with oversight from the American Council of Learned Society. Its intent is to encourage and reward outstanding teaching in the humanities. Nearly 40 private colleges and universities in Oregon, Washington and California are eligible to nominate one faculty member for the honor.
The next request for proposals will be announced in fall 2017. For more information, contact the Office for Faculty Research & Resources.
